Mark Acklom: Serial conman who posed as MI6 spy to defraud woman out of life savings jailed for five years

Former public schoolboy was found in Switzerland with new wife and family

A serial conman who posed as a MI6 agent has been jailed after he admitted to defrauding his ex-girlfriend out of her life savings of nearly £300,000.

Married Mark Acklom convinced Carolyn Woods they were in a “committed relationship” as he posed as a Swiss banker and spy.

The former public schoolboy had a year-long relationship with her after they met in a boutique she worked at in Tetbury, Gloucestershire.

He went on to convince her into lending £299,564 of her life savings in 2012 for renovation work at a number of properties in Bath, Somerset.

Having swindled her, he then went on the run, becoming one of the UK’s most wanted fugitives as part of Operation Captura, a multi-agency initiative to track down British criminals abroad.

In May 2017, he was spotted in the Swiss city of Geneva and arrested the following month.

He was found at a luxury apartment in Zurich where he had been living under a false name. He was married to Maria Yolanda Ros Rodriguez at the time of his arrest and had two young daughters.

Subsequently extradited from Switzerland, Acklom has now admitted five counts of fraud by false representation before his trial at Bristol Crown Court was due to start.

His barrister, Gudrun Young, asked for him to be re-arraigned after a jury had been sworn in his trial.

Sentencing Acklom, Judge Martin Picton told him: "You took advantage of your victim in a cruel and cynical manner. I accept that you did not target your victim from the outset. But it is plain that once you knew what you might glean from her, you set about doing so in a ruthless and utterly selfish manner. You were quite prepared to spin a web of lies, and you cared not at all for the emotional impact."

Acklom had previously received a four-year custodial sentence for a £466,000 mortgage fraud in 1991, after he posed as a City stockbroker when he was 16.

He also spent £11,000 after stealing his father's credit card, swindled a former teacher out of £13,000 and ran up a £34,000 bill with a private charter jet company.

Despite being a teenager, Acklom managed to convince Leeds Permanent Building Society that he was a 25-year-old stockbroker on £214,000 a year.

They gave him a £466,000 mortgage for a £516,000 executive home in Dulwich, south London.

In that trial, Acklom’s barrister claimed he was a “disturbed” teenager out of touch with reality who stole the credit card "for wining and dining girlfriends and to live an extravagant lifestyle beyond his means ... he could not possibly have hoped to get away with it".

Agencies contributed to this report